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What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

jacquescorbytuech.com

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Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#331

Post by kilroy123 »

cadamsdotcom wrote: post #103

I’m constantly amazed how passive people are with things that steal their attention My phone is in do not disturb mode 24/7. If your app notifies me about something pointless, it gets deleted and I start using your website instead I have a mail rule that moves any email with the word “unsubscribe” out of the inbox into its own tagged area. Every few days, I go in and unsubscribe to everything that’s arrived. Whenever…

I made a more advanced version of the unsubscribe thing to kill all unnecessary notifications from email. I made it open-sourced:

https://unfuck.email

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#332

Post by hgoel »

lanerobertlane wrote: post #24

If my phone interrupts me, it should either mean someone genuinely needs my attention right now or it should not be disrupting me at all. That's my notification set up. Apps allowed to receive push notifications Phone, Messages, Whatsapp, Apple Health, [brand] bank. That concludes the list. There is no reason any other app needs to be able to instantly ping me. Most apps are not notifying you because something matter…

Might as well use a dumb phone

I don't get what you guys are doing to be so bothered by notifications. I get them on my wirst and even then it isn't enough to take away mental bandwidth.

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#333

Post by bossyTeacher »

dwedge wrote: post #330
bossyTeacher wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I guess you probably have no dependents and never been oncall then if you are on no disturb. For many people, having to poll the state of multiple ongoing tasks is time consuming itself or/and focus breaking enough that some apps are deserving of having notifications. Manually polling multiple items as you go around your day is stealing valuable mental bandwidth that could be used in better things.

> Manually polling multiple items as you go around your day is stealing valuable mental bandwidth that could be used in better things. I both agree and disagree with you. I disabled notifications for everything and found myself refreshing email too often. But if I have the notifications, I can get disturbed too often which also takes mental bandwidth. For me I found the best tactic was to selectively enable notificat…

> the best tactic was to selectively enable notifications (whatsapp for just one person), and delete (not silence) everything else

Hundred percent agree. I wouldn't support having notifications for everything enabled.

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#334

Post by everdrive »

lanerobertlane wrote: post #24

If my phone interrupts me, it should either mean someone genuinely needs my attention right now or it should not be disrupting me at all. That's my notification set up. Apps allowed to receive push notifications Phone, Messages, Whatsapp, Apple Health, [brand] bank. That concludes the list. There is no reason any other app needs to be able to instantly ping me. Most apps are not notifying you because something matter…

Maybe it's for the best. The best practice is to have as few apps as possible. The moment an app is abusive with notifications, you know it's time to drop the app anyhow. A lot of people need that one final push to drop the app, so this could help.

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#335

Post by alexlesuper »

leonidasv wrote: post #222
tambeb wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Notification categories are like mailing lists now. You may have unsubscribed from the daily deals email but you're still going to be auto subscribed to every new slightly modified category in perpetuity. Unless you fully disable notifications for an app (in Android at least, in my experience), new enabled by default notification categories are added all the time.

When they exist at all. Many apps that provide important notifications (like delivery tracking, drop-off time etc) put them under the same category as marketing stuff. You can't have just the transactional tracking, you have to opt-in for the marketing notifications as well.

The ridesharing apps are the most annoying about this. Yes I want to be notified when my uber driver is almost here to pick me up. No, I don't want a notification about yet another sale.

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#336

Post by 1718627440 »

bossyTeacher wrote: post #310
1718627440 wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your house already has a built-in notification system, which can be activated by the delivery guy, once he is physically at your location.

A built-in notification system that everyone from your local politician asking for your vote to your Jehovah Witness recruiter can and does abuse. Way to waste your time.

You can silence it just as easy and in difference to the digital alternatives, the amount of time wasted is symmetric.

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#337

Post by projektfu »

hunter2_ wrote: post #182
_carbyau_ wrote: post #162

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Why would I want that? Because to get that far they entered your password? Which you might like to change? You did mention: "You are a two factor app." If they've got past your first factor, you might want to know.

I recently got an unsolicited OTP email from Microsoft, which led me to fear that someone had entered my password, but no: I eventually was able to confirm that the arrival of an OTP does not, in fact, require that someone enter anything beyond my email address. This is rather insane (I should not be having a blood pressure event due to Microsoft) but on the other hand I do understand the passwordless concept which i…

Some providers (looking at you, Intuit) don't seem to understand TWO factor authentication and will allow someone to bypass your password if they can intercept the SMS or email, and treat it as a normal login.

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#338

Post by miki123211 »

lanerobertlane wrote: post #24

If my phone interrupts me, it should either mean someone genuinely needs my attention right now or it should not be disrupting me at all. That's my notification set up. Apps allowed to receive push notifications Phone, Messages, Whatsapp, Apple Health, [brand] bank. That concludes the list. There is no reason any other app needs to be able to instantly ping me. Most apps are not notifying you because something matter…

The worst are apps that bundle genuinely urgent notifications with maketing brain-manipulation promotional crap.

Uber is a notorious example. I do genuinely want Uber notifications for when I use Uber. I do not care about whatever promotion it pushes at me.

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#339

Post by spwa4 »

account42 wrote: post #299
spwa4 wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You mean it's a consequence of very large amounts of people refusing to pay for software, at essentially any other cost ... Of course you could describe almost all of the internet that way.

I don't pay for most of my software and yet it still respects me. Of course it also isn't made by large corporations with marketing and sales departments.

The vast majority of spammers aren't large corporations but really small ones. Scammy ones. At least judging by my spam folder.

Re: What Apple and Google are doing to push notifications

#340

Post by miki123211 »

1718627440 wrote: post #283
0cf8612b2e1e wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I recently had to setup Microsoft Authenticator. It refused to register a code unless I enabled notifications. You are a two factor app. I should never be in a situation where there is an unexpected login I need to verify.

Apps can know whether you granted permission?? That sounds like a security flaw.

This is basically required for clueless (and even not so clueless) users.

If there's a chat app I installed 3 years ago, with no intention of giving it camera access, and I suddenly need to use that app for a video call, I don't want to be stuck debugging broken camera issues for two hours. I'd much rather have the app tell me that it doesn't have camera access.

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